


Seize The Moment

by duckbunny



Series: Camaraderie [9]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Asexual Character, M/M, Non-Sexual Kink, Platonic BDSM, Relationship Negotiation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-21
Updated: 2016-01-21
Packaged: 2018-05-15 09:51:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5781322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duckbunny/pseuds/duckbunny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alexander knows Laurens doesn't need him. Laurens knows Alexander is unhappy. Sooner or later, even tomcats and soldier boys have to talk.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Seize The Moment

Alexander can't stop looking at Laurens.

The army is on the move again and Washington with it. They've been riding all morning and can expect to be riding all afternoon; there's no hope they'll be pitching their tents in daylight. The most they can hope for is a good moon, else they'll be doing it all by feel and no doubt covering half the canvas in mud before they get it raised. The winter days are short and chill, the wind biting at Alexander's fingers.

Laurens rides ahead of him. He's grateful for that small mercy; he's not sure he could help himself if they rode side-by-side, would still be staring at him and with far less excuse. He is dwelling on how Laurens looked last time they – last time. How he melted under Alexander's hands, all the fight gone out of him. How he wanted, needed, everything Alexander did to him. How he looked with his hands tied.

He is dwelling, too, on what Eliza said, when he came home and confessed.

Alexander has been watching Laurens for years. He knows all the shadings of how he moves, the way he sits his horse when he's tired or worried, the difference between ordinary frustrations and the itch he never talks about. He knows that Laurens today is stiff from a poor night's sleep and that the frown when he looks back is impatience to be working on the essay he'll likely have to put off again tonight. He _knows_ that Laurens does not need anything Alexander has to offer.

They make camp in the brief dusk, the stars flaring into life overhead as they hand their horses off to be cared for and answer Washington's summons to go over what correspondence came in on the march and must go out at first light. By the time they are released to pitch their own little shelter in the shadow of the General's command tent, it is well past dark and the mud has frozen, drumming under their bootheels and resisting the pegs they stubbornly hammer into the ground. The sky is clear, favouring them with moonlight and promising the temperature will only drop further. Alexander's hands are so cold he can't work the straps on his pack; he throws it at Laurens and makes himself useful getting the last of the canvas pegged out. He crawls into the tent to find his blankets and Laurens' laid out together and Laurens hurriedly tugging his boots off.

“Don't argue,” Laurens says pre-emptively, “it's far too damn cold for anything else.”

Alexander doesn't argue. He keeps his face turned away, eyes on his boots as he struggles clumsily with the laces and uses his toes to work them off, trying to keep his hands out of the coating of mud that has climbed inch-deep up to the ankle. Then he worms his way into the blankets and wraps his arms around his own belly. His back is to Laurens, but he can't help straining to hear as he swears at the state of his socks – wet with mud – and hunts out a dry pair in the pitch dark of the tent. Laurens joining him under the blankets is a rush of icy air and then a gathering warmth, a little furnace burning at his back.

He startles at a sudden poke against his shoulder.

“Hamilton,” Laurens says, low and concerned behind him, “you could not be less content if you were sharing your blankets with a bear. What's amiss?”

“Nothing,” he says stiffly, “I am perfectly well. Go to sleep.”

“That will be difficult with you stewing away next to me. Are we not good enough friends, after so long? May I not share your troubles?”

Laurens sounds so sincere, it makes Alexander want to cry. It is all wrong, everything he wants to say. “I -” he starts, and has to stop and clear his throat, and by then Laurens has pressed up close behind him and is stroking his arm, slow and gentle through the jacket it's too cold to take off. Alexander stares into the darkness.

“I want to hit you,” he says quietly, and the hand on his arm stops moving.

Laurens' breath is hot against his neck. “I don't need you to – tonight, anyway – you don't have to-”

“I know,” he says. “Do you think I can't tell that by now? Christ, Laurens, do you think – do you still think this is all for your sake? That I don't -” He swallows back the rest of his words, the ones that want to spill out and tell Laurens he deserves better than Alexander. He promised Eliza he would not say such things to him.

“Is it not?”

“It never has been. Not since the first time Lafayette let me in on the game. I always wanted to see… to see that. To make you look that way, for my own satisfaction. I wish never to hurt you more than you desire, but… I wish to hurt you, within that.”

“And you only mention this now?” Laurens sounds wretched. “Alexander, your _wife_.”

“Knows. I told her, when we were in town, after I followed you home. I confessed to her what I had done and she said she already knew your – preferences, from Angelica. She said she would far rather we amused each other than sought our satisfaction with any who loved us less. She did make me promise not to sodomise you,” he adds, “I didn't think you would object.”

Laurens splutters with laughter. “No, of course not. Of all the things to trade away!”

He tugs at Alexander's arm again and this time Alexander yields, rolling over to face him.

“It is too cold,” Laurens says seriously, “for such things tonight. I am sorry, believe me. But the answer is _yes_ , and never doubt it. I seem to have spent half my life trying not to burden you with it, but I would far rather you than anyone else.” He tucks himself close, resting his head against Alexander's chest, and Alexander wraps an arm around him by instinct. He is a familiar weight, one solid thing in all the dark rustling night.

“Go to sleep, Laurens,” he says softly. “Warmer days will come.”


End file.
